• by Adam Buckman , Featured Columnist, 8 hours ago

Another day, another TV series about a crime family.

By now, every TV series and movie about organized crime comes adapted from all the other TV shows and movies of the last hundred years. 

The reality of organized crime and how it works must be so complicated -- and possibly, duller than one might think -- that the only way to make a mob show or movie today is to fill it with violence stemming from a rivalry with another crime family.

Even David Chase -- creator of the best TV series ever made about mobster life, “The Sopranos” -- once admitted when the show ended after six seasons that he still didn’t understand what the mafia did.

But here comes another mob show in which a proud Irish family (judging by their name, Phelan) believes that Liverpool is theirs -- thus the show’s title, “This City Is Ours,” premiering Thursday on AMC+.

Yes, Liverpool -- a municipality that may be new to the mobster canon, but is best known now and forever as the birthplace of the Beatles.

But alas -- John, Paul, George and Ringo go unacknowledged in the first episode of “This City Is Ours,” which the TV Blog previewed on Wednesday.

Nor is any Beatles music heard in the episode. Instead, you get the original version of “A Well-Respected Man” by the Kinks (a band formed in London), and covers of “Mack the Knife” (not Bobby Darin from the Bronx), “Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You” (not The Four Seasons from Newark, New Jersey) and “The House of Bamboo” (not Andy Williams from Wall Lake, Iowa).

Why bring all this up? Maybe it is because there is not all that much to say about this new mob series that has not been said about others.

Here is the basic outline, anyway. The Phelan crime family of Liverpool consists mainly of the patriarch, Ronnie Phelan played by Sean Bean (photo above), his trusted right-hand man Michael Kavanagh (James Nelson-Joyce), his son Jamie (Jack McMullen) and assorted others.

Ronnie Phelan juggles his responsibilities for his crime interests with his role as family patriarch like an Irish Tony Soprano, but without the therapy or the artistry.

In Episode One of “This City Is Ours,” a deal with another crime clan goes awry and mayhem ensues.

There is even a Catholic baptism scene in the premiere episode of “This City Is Ours,” but no one gets whacked during the ceremony.

Like so many other mob movies and TV shows, this show features hideous explosions of violence. 

One beating in particular was so nasty and disgusting that I had to look away, which runs counter to the purpose of TV shows, which is to retain -- rather than repel -- viewership.

“This City Is Ours” starts streaming on Thursday (March 5) on AMC+.